This article ended up more serious than I intended it to be. There’s a fair amount of the usual drinking, sex and scandal, but it’s being looked at in a slightly different way. Less ‘whey!’ and more woe one might say if you were going to be a pretentious twat and attempt a very poor pun. I just did. Don’t judge me.

Anyway, it’s clear that a lot of us have done a lot of things we wish we hadn’t this term. Perhaps unsurprisingly, the most frequently occurring topics were sex and relationships (minefield that), drinking too much and working too little. One member of the Tab Team regrets “drinking so much that by 10pm I had to be carried home by a girl whose name has become a by-word for obscene drunkenness. You know it’s a bad night when she’s the responsible one”. Another girl put it quite succinctly revealing “I regret every night I spent the next day apologising for”. It’s not just your friendships and/or any dignity you have left that is at risk; it’s your bank balance. “I regret spending £1500 this term. Definitely not including my college bill. Definitely including Ballare”. This from the same person who got carried home before Grandma’s bedtime. Recurring theme? Perhaps: almost every person I spoke to listed alcohol as one of their top regrets. I regret telling a notorious gossip in our college something he really didn’t need to know. Under the influence you understand, but having such an eager ear of course he remembered. And now so does everyone else.

I’m not the only one with regrettable drunken revelations however. Someone else reveals they drunkenly apologised for sleeping with someone’s ex-boyfriend, only for her confession to be greeted with “He’s not my ex”. Fuck. Another reason to keep your mouth shut when drunk, is the boy who called his DoS fat when inebriated. How he came to be in his DoS’ company whilst in such a state or whether it was indeed an accurate assessment has yet to be established.

Moving away from alcohol as we all are clearly planning to do following a Lent of pain, let’s have a look at your work situation. This was another big failure on most of our parts. A lot regret the pathetically small number of lectures actually attended, and fact most of the ones you graced with your presence were spent on the verge of vomiting/passing out/falling asleep and snoring in a most unattractive manner. Pretty much everyone involved regretted procrastinating so much. I regret getting so stressed about the whole thing when we’ve got eight weeks of hyper-tension coming up in the shape of exams. Yeah, depressing right. A Clareite says he regrets not complaining about a supervisor who made him feel like shit every supervision. Another male undergraduate regrets sleeping with his supervisor because every supervision since has been massively awkward. Guess who we have more sympathy for? Man points yes, sympathy definitely not if your problem is completely and utterly your own fault. The general theme, as you may have anticipated, centres on a lack of lectures attended, essays handed in on time and anything done without the infinite help of Wikipedia. Procrastination also plays a large factor. One boy told me he regretted the amount of time he spent on Redtube. Having no idea what this meant I googled and now really hope the college doesn’t monitor what we look at on the internet.

On the contrary, someone else says he regrets doing so much extracurricular that between that and keeping up some semblance of a degree he hasn’t seen any of his friends in about six weeks. At the same time I had a few of you lamenting your lack of extra-curricular. Someone else made me quite sad when she revealed “I’ve done all the work on time but I don’t have any friends here. All I do is work and I’m still not getting a first. That’s my biggest regret right now”. Hopefully that will help the rest of you feel less guilty. Also if any of you are from Queens’ maybe try and be nice to a really quiet girl in your year.

Then we have the regrets which are and aren’t regrets. I regret discovering Proplus but I couldn’t get by without it. I regret getting so little sleep but I have no idea how it would have been avoidable. Also I am well aware those two regrets are connected. This seems a perfect time to bring in the sex and relationships section, because so many of you are incredibly indecisive and a lot of these regrets I got sent in could fall either way. A Newnham girl regrets breaking up with her boyfriend. Someone else regrets the fact she got back together with hers. A second year regrets cheating on his girlfriend of a year but doesn’t regret the fact it led to them breaking up. Told you it was complicated. Someone said he regrets not taking advantage of his drunk friend one night, but then again how can he be sure he wouldn’t have regretted it if he had taken advantage of her? Another girl regrets telling someone she liked him only for him to tell her he was actually interested in her best friend and could she please leave him to it. Knobhead.

I’d like to be able to have a clear cut line here, say that everyone who didn’t sleep with them regretted it or vice versa, but someone regrets “having sex with somebody because I was depressed and he was there”. Someone else regrets it “because everyone in college knows”. At the same time, another person regrets not doing it “just because I knew I shouldn’t”. Everyone who told me they didn’t do it seemed to regret it because they wanted to, and those that did regretted it because of how things turned out. Catch 22 much? The intensity of college gossip was also a big factor in a lot of your regrets this term. ‘Everyone knows everyone’s business and that puts so much more pressure on everything’ was the general consensus. ‘Really fucking annoying’ in other words.

Basically we’ve all done a lot of things we wish we hadn’t and no one seems to have ended up happy with what they choose to do (the grass is always greener). I regret the things I said, more so the things I didn’t; the work I should have done and the things I shouldn’t have. I regret a term of too much wine and not enough sleep. But then again, had I done it any other way I would have regretted that too. Maybe not as much; maybe more. And the same goes for every single one of you who sent me an email, an inbox message or spoke to me in person. So fuck it. Bring on the vacation.

Anonymau5

There is no way that this person was denying the existence of male rape victims or child sexual victims. If you read it properly, it was quite the opposite. Nevermind the fact that the President called false rape accusations imaginary. How is this allowed in universities?

Kay

Yep and nor did Alex ever accuse him of denying those things. She said ‘disregard’ which is what he did. He wanted to talk about false rape accusations as an issue, which it is not, no more or less than any other false accusations. Someone else has pointed this out below.

Fuckherrightinthepussy

She said his comment disregarded them, he was in support of the victims both male and female.

beaten down and spat upon

I am a single, proud womyn living in an apartment, barely making ends meet, with nothing to motivate me to continue my wretched existence. Yet I preservere, because i wish to prove to the world I, too, am capable of surviving this patriarchal cis-scum dominated world as a womyn not bound to a man.

But Alex Wilson is the kind of person who would rather have me whoring out my body, submitting to the scum who dominate this society, to be able to live. For it is utterly despicable to see that despite stating that care would be taken while posting sensitive content, the very President makes several crude references to rape.

This is an utter travesty. I have been triggered by this vile person, and it is their kind that would see me drowning in a flood of the patriarchy’s horrifying visions of slavery and, I shudder to say it, sexual assault.

I respect kindly but firmly to those who are in this group to oust Alex Wilson from the post of President because it is clear that Alex Wilson is an abhorrent being capable of causing only isolation and harm to womyn, unfit thus to take upon this mantle she feels herself so capable of wearing.

You disgust me.

Olivia

Yawn. Have you ever spoken to her? She’s one of the loveliest people I’ve ever met, and I think her prioritising of women over men is absolutely justified considering the focus of feminism is to help oppressed genders.

I fail to see why the Feminists’ Network policy is reason for a personal attack.

Liberalfeminist1993

Olivia, I totally agree with you but I still don’t think FemSoc acted appropriately or adult like in this regard.

I hate to admit it, but we are wrong on this one. Let it go…

Boogaloo

But why though? Any space which gives a fair hearing to the idea that false accusations are a big problem is pretty automatically making it not a good place for any rape victims around. It’s basically saying to them “we will entertain the idea that you are a liar”.

FemSocMember

It was trigger marked, so rape victims would prepare or ignore..if a safe space covered everything we would hardly be able to to mention any points of interest.

Boogaloo

Well I suppose you can disagree with what a safe space means but if those are the rules of the groups you still can’t complain if he broke them. And anyway, there is a big difference between trigger warning for rape being mentioned or stats about rape and full blown discussion of “maybe rape victims are lying”. You can’t really compare the two.

moleman

A feminist admitting they are in the wrong! Is that not one of the 7 signs of the apocalypse?

Kay

The post that this thread was attached to was marked with trigger warnings, so the ‘crude’ rape references are already marked. Fortunately it was also already marked with rape denial as well, so Muwahhid’s comments were trigger-warned too.

Liberalfeminist1993

Mr. Abbasi never denied that rape doesn’t not happen. He said that Alex’s first comment was not true. Alex then changed her point to children – an entirely different matter. It changes the meaning of what she meant.

It is clear that Mr. Abbasi was basically saying that just because you are more likely to be raped as a man (adult not child) doesn’t mean false rape accusations are a matter so small they aren’t worth talking about.

And the worst part is, as a feminist myself, that Alex called false rape allegations, imaginary. That comment disgusted me.

General_Cross

The missing part of this is the numbers. Mr Abbasi was arguing that a higher percentage of men men suffer false rape allegations than are actually raped, despite pending sources that refute that statement. The point the President makes is that male child victims alone outnumber those falsely accused of rape.

TheScotsman

No, you are right there.
But you forget one thing, men aren’t children and children aren’t men. Child and adult sex abuse are different. Her original point differs from what her evidence provided for, which is exactly why Muwahhid said on the freshers page that he agreed with one of their points. That is the bit he said was not true, the original statement. After Alex provided evidence for a different “fact” to her original statement, Muwahhid moved on. Nowhere did he deny rape of any gender. Plain and simple.

Boogaloo

Except there are stats right there in the screenshot for both child and adult male victims? She put both? In fact there are two stats for adult victims and only one for children?

TheScotsman

I don’t see any stats for false rape accusations.
Didn’t Mr. Abbasi start his point with innocent until proven guilty about the whole women are assumed to be liars thing? That wasn’t answered at all…

Boogaloo

Yeah neither brought up stats. Abbasi asserted that false rape allegations were an issue worth discussing, but neglected to to provide any of his own evidence. Also I notice that you have not engaged with the point that you are wrong about Alex just making a point about child abuse. If you’re going to say she is in the wrong at least actually get what she said right.

TheScotsman

Nope, his original point was the way our legal system works. Then he said Alex was wrong. He didn’t go on to provide counter evidence, because it looks like he was confused as to why she changed from grown men to children. It looks to me after he questioned why she changed her fact and he spoke about MRAs, he was banned before he could do so.

And he was within the group rules..

Boogaloo

But she didn’t change what facts she said? She said child victims “alone” and then went on to give stats for adult and child victims? I’m really confused as to why people keep saying that she “changed” it from adults to children when the screenshot is right there in the article? The article text says that she just gave a number for child victims but it’s contradicted in the screenshot. Sloppy Journalism.

TheRationalist

Her first comment states men- adults

When Mr.Abbasi said it’s not true, she said children..hence why Mr
Abbasi mentioned that he thought they meant adults. That’s different, which is why he said that he agreed with one of their points when.he posted to.the freshers page.

He probably feels and so would I if I were him, that he was unjustly banned even though all.he said was that both rape and false rape are important issues, no matter how small.

Boogaloo

She said “children alone”, which is clearly supposed to mean that adults will be factored in as well. And then in literally the next comment said children and adults. Maybe Abbasi didn’t see the second comment before he replied to the first one which did just say children and that is why he got confused. But reference to children and adults is there plain to see. You can’t argue that she talked about adults, it is right there. I can see it. This line of argument is deeply unconvincing.

TheRationalist

But he made his first comment only in response to the INITIAL comment. She replied after his first comment. I don’t.understand why you don’t see this?

Boogaloo

And I don’t understand why you are insisting that she only talked about child victims when she didn’t? I actually don’t see what your point is? False rape allegations were the topic of the whole article. BUT he was the one that was insisting that they were a big issue which is the opposite of what Feminists believe. And the opposite of what the article was saying.

TheRationalist

That’s where you are wrong, he said just because one is bigger than the other, doesn’t make something a non issue

That’s the crux of it.

Boogaloo

Except he literally said that there are “lots of false rape allegations” which is what the exception was taken to. Feminists maintain that there aren’t. So I’m not sure what he expected. Also if their policy is the support rape victims they’re not going to give a platform for a person who think that lots of them are lying are they?

General_Cross

What do you think Mr Abbasi meant when he said “Women aren’t assumed to be liars?”

TheRationalist

I’m 100% certain that he meant what he said. Innocent until proven guilty. We pride ourselves on this, and other countries copied us.

General_Cross

Agreed. Now put this in the frame of rape cases, where evidence either way is very difficult to find. There were most likely members of the Feminist Network who were sexually assaulted but were unable to prove the person guilty.

So are you telling me that trying to start a debate on this point isn’t breaking the safe space rules?

TheRationalist

The whole post was trigger warned. And again, that fits with the rules.

General_Cross

Trigger warnings are only there to identify the points of interest being shared. They do not endorse debate. If you can quote me where in the comments policy where a trigger warning means ‘anything goes’ I’ll reconsider.

TheRationalist

Whats the point of the article posting then? Why did the very president initiate debate? It wasn’t sharing points of interest alone.

I’ll give you the broke.the spirit, but not th rules…if we presenred this to a court, they’d favour him, just.

General_Cross

I’m glad that we can agree that rules were broken by Mr Abbasi in those case, even if in spirit.

I agree that there is a grey zone between the educating and debating in the group. It’s a difficult stance to maintain. The compromise reached is that only articles and comments that do not cause disruption can be entered, but I do think its a system that needs revising at some point. There is a fine line between acknowledgement of information and agreement, and sometimes the wrong calls are made.

Nevertheless, in a case like Mr Abbasi, who’s comments were clearly going to aggravate a sensitive issue, I think the right decision was made.

TheRationalist

After being on his side most of way, I have lowered my opinion of him.

But I still believe it was an unfair ban..he was told clearly he was misogynist and thus banned. That was not right. He never actually.broke a rule, and the FemSoc should’ve had a better response.

General_Cross

Perhaps so, and I do think that there was a more diplomatic way to could have been handled. It is worth mentioning that dozens of people sign up to the society to try and upset the members of the society, and its ordinary students trying to keep the group in order.

As I mentioned before, I’m disappointed with the Tap for their reporting primarily.

Boogaloo

Yeah but they clearly take the line that talking about false rape allegations as a serious issue is a violation of a safe space policy. And since concern about false rape allegations is the hallmark of the MRA they were probably playing it on the safe side. And they say in the comments policy that they value rape victims feeling welcome over debate. Talking about false allegations is not going to make rape victims feel welcome. They even ask specifically in the comments policy for people to be sensitive when discussing rape. Which suggests that they are always tougher on these issues. So no he wasn’t within the rules. And whether he broke the letter, he certainly broke the spirit.

General_Cross

This is the problem. Whilst there is a discussion here to be had, the space Mr Abbasid has trying to have it was not appropriate. The issue isn’t that Abbasid disagrees, it’s that he disregarded the Facebook group rules.

Also she said “alone” when she brought up child male victims. So that’s clearly not suggesting that the argument was to be based just on numbers of boys who were abused.

Actually.

Actually, I think an important point (which has been missed here) is that men actually *are* orders of magnitude more likely to be a victim of sexual assault than ever be falsely accused of a sex crime, if you include male victims of sexual assault in the military and rape in prison. Shame the girl didn’t make that point.

Kay

As I understand it (and as was iterated by a member after the comment), Alex was addressing the treatment of false rape allegations as a big, separate issue to any false allegations. It is not. I acknowledge it was poorly phrased but we’re all human. Also, Alex’s differing statistics are presumably because she couldn’t immediately provide statistics for her original point (although nor could Muwahhid for his counterpoint), so gave an alternative refutation.

beaten down and spat upon

P. S. : After calming down from my anger, I would like to clarify. My intention is not to insult, but to educate. For only in strictness will our womyn learn care, and only in care will we even succeed as a cause. The picture you present of yourself, Ms. President, is one entirely unrepresentative of our cause. We are not hypocrites, after all. I found it deeply disturbing and shocking to see such a post without any warning whatsoever, and would appreciate more care in the near future.

Kate

Hello, I’m the person who made the original post, which is not shown. (It gave statistics about the prevalence of false rape accusations that started this discussion.)

As has been stated above, this was clearly trigger-marked at the very beginning of the post. The Tab has failed to give you access to the full thread, which has understandably raised your concerns, but let me assure you I warned of rape, rape culture, and rape denial at the top of the post. Feminists’ Network policy is very clear on this and the rule is thoroughly enforced.

Tom

Anyone who wants to see the full thing can join your group.

Kate

Why, yes. But anyone discussing this thread should be aware of the entire thread. The Tab has not provided that, which should caution respondants to be aware they might not be getting the full story.

TheRationalist

Forget trigger warnings. I don’t really give a damn about this guy but looking at the full post and this article, the bloke was unfairly dismissed. Accept that.

Boogaloo

Have you read their comments policy though? If you haven’t you can’t really say whether he was unfairly removed or not.

TheRationalist

I have. That’s precisely why I said he was unfairly dismissed. I don’t care for either parties, but the full discussion available to me. He was not misogynistic, accept it.

Boogaloo

Yeah but worrying about false rape accusations is like the biggest thing that MRA’s and other misogynists go on about. I’ve never seen them brought up anywhere without a misogynist or anti-feminist agenda. I’m not sure I would have given him the benefit of the doubt.

confusedfeminist

There’s not misogyny in what he said though

Boogaloo

False rape accusations are pretty much MRA’s number one thing to go on about though. I’ve never seen anyone without some kind of anti-feminist agenda raise them as a serious issue.

TheRationalist

It doesn’t matter because his main point was saying that women were not deemed liars. Innocent until.proven guilty was his point. Before he got banned. Alex derailed him

Boogaloo

Why doesn’t it matter? He disagreed with what Alex said so she responded to that. She made a statement. He said that the statement was wrong. She said why it was right. Then it went from there. I’m not sure how that counts as derailing.

Kay

‘Women are not deemed liars’ is rape culture denial, which is misogynistic. Hope this clears things up for everyone.

Unless you’ve experienced the process of reporting a rape yourself you have no right to deny my own statement.

Please don’t assume my opinions are second-hand.

Fuckherrightinthepussy

Yes, I do. Do I have to be a Russian to know the Purges by Stalin were bad? No.

It is how our legal system works. Innocent until proven guilty. I am proud of this. Don’t call this rape culture, Britain’s legal system has been a model for many others. Fuck off with your bullshit.

Kay

You don’t have the right to say something doesn’t happen when others have experienced it first hand. Your analogy is flawed.

noNOno

denying ‘rape culture’ is not misogynistic, as the concept of rape culture is just an opinion.

Kalooni

So it can never be mentioned without the speaker being an MRA or anti-feminist?

Get real.

Fuckherrightinthepussy

Well said.

General_Cross

This article lacks a lot of context both for the situation and comments made by the parties. The facebook group’s own comments policy states that it is not a place for discussion of issues due to sensitive content. Your free speech does not allow you to shout ‘Fire!’ in a crowded cinema as it is distressing and disturbing. The real life meetings are the stage for these kinds of questions. Nonetheless Mr Abbasi seems to have tried to turn it into a debate, and should not besurprised that he was removed.

Moreover, I think that the ‘confused fresher’ description is also misleading. Mr Abbasi clearly has an agenda if he wished to instigate weekly debates on the point (but never actually attend a physical meeting).

On the questions of sources, the FemSoc group has consistently provided good supporting evidence for any statistics quoted, whereas Mr Abbasi was simply throwing statements about without backing his arguments, eventually becoming flippant and disregarding.

Fundamentally the role of the facebook group is set out by the elected members of the society. If Mr Abbasi really wanted to have a constructive argument he should have come to the discussion group in person and spoken with other members in person.

Likewise the author of this article should consider reporting more honestly about the situation rather than deliberately misrepresenting the stance of the Feminist Society.

TheScotsman

Whilst we don’t know the circumstances of Mr. Abbasi, I’ve got to disagree with you on some points. The very same policy also states that any posts about such content should be appropriately labelled with trigger warnings, and I don’t see any. This is also coming from the President herself.

Similarly, if you look at Mr. Abbasi’s comment on the Fresher’s page (where the issue was publicized), one of the member’s of FemSoc said it was a place for discussion – who is right here? Do be aware that this post was dated after the latest meeting, so it would be another week to a physical meeting. We don’t know his circumstances here, what if he lives off-campus?

And correct me if I’m wrong, but evidence lies on the person who made the claim – in this case the President. This is a very serious matter. Maybe the FemSoc if very accurate and unbiased, but this wasn’t shown – not at all.

Also, I’m pretty sure that Mr. Abbasi wasn’t stupid enough to go into the group with the intention of creating such fire. If he was spouting vitriol – he deserves to be banned. If anything was vitriol, it was calling false rape allegations “imaginary” i.e. the very President. Such views should not be tolerated at a respected institution like York. If you read the post itself, you can see what his intentions were. He wanted opinions on GamerGate, and he would add them to his own article an/or blog without giving away FemSoc member’s personal information. Finally, the Fresher’s page has a pretty good breakdown of the situation – judge for yourself.

Also, don’t shoot the messenger. The author took official responses from the FemSoc, and direct quotes from Mr. Abbasi. Don’t make the author the enemy.

General_Cross

I feel I’m missing something here as I’m not sure where GamerGate has come into this. The article and all its screenshots are from comments on an article about false rape claims on the FemSoc’s own page. FemSoc would be unable to ban anybody unless the comments were made on their own page.

The original post did contain trigger warnings on the article so Mr Abbasi should have been aware that he was breaking the comment policy.

As for the circumstances of Mr Abbasi, it doesn’t matter whether he can attend meetings or not. There are places on the internet that you can freely discuss feminism and issues in the world. The FemSoc page is not intended to be such a place.

My grief with the author is that this article is written with intent to misrepresent the situation. Quotes are given out of context and missing important information. A large part of the post that caused this issue is missing, which can lead to confusion of how the decision to ban the member was made.

TheScotsman

I was talking about Mr.Abbasi’s reaction post to the freshers page. There are no trigger warnings that I can see on the FemSoc page. Other members said that that it was okay for him to comment, well at least that’s what they said on the freshers page and also encouraged it.

What is wrong with him going local? You can say that about almost anything – it is irrelevant. The society is in the same university as him, it’s not your right to say that. Nothing is out of context, the post is visible in its entirety. The quotes from the FemSoc president were taken directly from a phone call to her and this article was written by the London HQ, who conducted that interview because of the serious nature of the story. Do not attack the authors.

The President made it clear why he was banned. It’s from her mouth, but as you can see, few agree.

General_Cross

Can I confirm we are discussing why he was removed from the group? The response post was placed after he was banned. The reason for him being banned was contained the in original post on the page. All I’m saying is that Mr Abbasi can’t feel wronged if he read the comment policy and broke the rules of the group.

Outside of the FemSoc page Mr Abbasi can post whatever he likes and that is not being questioned here. Certainly there is no reference to GamerGate in his offending posts that I can see.

I am aware of the interview between the president and London HQ. The quotes were passed down from York and the real author contacted separately due to the belief that this article misrepresents the situation. For instance, there was an explanation for the statements about feminism ‘not being an equality movement’ and the false rape accusations, all of which are mysteriously absent from this piece. I think its fairly plain to see the bias in this article.

TheScotsman

Do you mean Mr. Abbasi saying it was not an equality movement? He never said that on their page.

Why do you keep bashing away at the idea he broke the rules? He did not and was told he was allowed to debate. We can see it didn’t even start as a debate. I have read Fsoc rules, and he did not breach them. And if you somehow think he did, then the President did too due to lack of trigger warnings.

I have seen all iterations of this article, and surpised it was changed at all. The original article written by a female York editor was questioned and Tab HQ took over. Tab sought info from both sides to straighten the matter. If you think bias remains, you’re delusional. Tab clearly believes FemSoc were bang out of order.

The situation has not been misrepresented. What you see is what he wrote, I was there when it happened. Like you said, outside he can do whatever. On what he posted, he should not have been banned. I’ve also been informed that a very large number of people who saw both his original post and reaction post support him. People who had opinions on neither side, they just did not wish to comment.

If after all this you think Mr. Abbasi was wrong and the article bias, you’re simply wrong.

Kate

“I’ve also been informed that a very large number of people who saw both
his original post and reaction post support him.”

Not sure where you’ve gotten this information but nobody in the Feminists’ Network facebook group has expressed support of him (quite the opposite) and the reaction has been similar on his subsequent complaint thread on the Freshers’ page.

The Tab has also not included the whole thread so please bear that in mind. Having made the original post I can once again assure you it gives a different picture.

TheRationalist

The feminist network isn’t FemSoc though.

criiipes

I’m afraid you’ve been misled on this one. There is no feminist society. The Feminists’ Network is part of the Women’s Committee and has not tried to become a society.

TheRationalist

I think you’ve been misled. He made the comments on the FemSoc page. The Feminist Network is separate.

Why? FemSoc hasn’t been ratified, and it’s all over the news that they are trying to become a society. It’s not official, but they are one. Reasons like this is why.

cripes’ sake

I’m afraid you’re not paying attention. There literally is no such thing as FemSoc. The Feminists’ Network was formerly known thereas, which is why people keep referring to it, but it has merged with WomCom.

It hasn’t been in the news for a couple of years and FYI the person who wanted it ratified is banned from FemNet for her hypocrisy.

General_Cross

To clarify, the President made the comment of feminism not being an equality movement. The article flicks between defending Mr Abbasi and putting down FemSoc and their President and its easy to be confused by who said what and when.

I also want to clarify your last line, as I am not wrong about either. In fact you agree with one of my points. My opinion on Mr Abbasi is simply that: my own opinion. My opinion cannot be right or wrong on a subjective issue, its just what I think. So to say my opinion is ‘wrong’ is nonsensical.

As for the bias of the article, I quote you that “Tab clearly believes FemSoc were bang out of order.” I’m interested to hear how an article can be unbiased, but yet you also acknowledge that it clearly state its own judgement on a topic?

To conclude: I agree with the decision of Feminist network to remove Mr Abbasi for his comments, this is my opinion and is no more right or wrong than your own opinion. However by your own admission Tap has reported on the issue with a clear bias towards one side.

Liberalfeminist1993

No, because most people have responded saying that based off the full post, FemSoc was wrong. Nothing more.

His complaint on the Freshers page was only answered by people angry with him. FemSoc members most likely. A few of my friends and even family said they agree with him but messaged him rather than commented because they didn’t want the hassle From FemSoc members.

guest

Sorry that you feel persecuted but unless you have evidence, don’t claim the people who responded to the Freshers’ thread were members of the Feminists’ Network.

Whether or not the admin was wrong to ban him is subjective, but the admin is the person FemNet entrusted the decision to, and their decision is final.

And bearing his reaction he’s not coming back.

Liberalfeminist1993

I totally agree but me viewing the post made me sure that he wasn’t being misogynistic and I feel that FemSoc went too far.

Let’s assume he was throughly interested in feminism. He won’t come back to a society that comes across as bitter to him now, even if he became a feminist tomorrow. It’s too much tension

Boogaloo

Yeah but false rape accusations are bread and butter to MRA’s. If their policy is to consider rape victims as the most important and that they value this over debate (as their comments policy states) then I’m not sure they could do anything else.

General_Cross

Had calmly and quietly asked the committee members they would have reconciled the ban. Instead he has jumped on a high horse and ridden away into the sunset. If he was really interested he would have asked why he was banned before trying to smear names.

TheRationalist

First thing he did was ask the most York student.populated page he knew.if.anyone.was treated the same.way. He didn’t smear anyone, not.at all. Read the he was freshers post he never attacked any.group.of.people and was very civil.despite.being.attacked by raging.feminists.

That takes some.consideration, no?

General_Cross

Yes I agree, I think he felt wrongly treated and looked for sympathy, and some of the responses he got were out of place (on both sides). It’s only natural to defend what you think.

I apologise, I have a number of issues with the Tap’s article on all this and I may have wrongly associated Mr Abbasi with the article written above.

TheRationalist

I don’t think he was looking for.sympathy but that he was confused.

Either he is a sneaky bastard or he was seriously in shock. It all seems too not thought out to be planned
All his responses sounded very what he was thinking at the moment rather than carefully constructed.

The only out.of.place comment in support of.him.was the homophobe. Everything else for.him.was fine, but people got scared of.the FemSoc bridgade.

This is why I believe him to.be confused as the article.says.

stillprotestingthisshit

Have you read his other posts on that thread? Someone up above has and apparently he’s called everyone a moron. Soooo yeah.

Fuckherrightinthepussy

No, he said “he would rather be immature than a moron,” as in the person who called him immature. She was being moronic. The first thing he did was post on an all view encompassing page full of student. It was the correct outlet.

cripesalmighty

“than a moron, which is all I saw from those on the page”
Go work for the Tab, since you like cherrypicking so much

Boogaloo

Yeah but they say he broke their comments policy and that’s why he was removed? Have you read it so that you can confirm that he didn’t break the rules?

TheScotsman

No, he didn’t. He was told was allowed and.encouraged to.debate.

Boogaloo

Who are these mysterious people who encourage debate? I’ve not seem them anywhere. I certainly can’t see them in the screenshots here. And the president herself says that the discussion is supposed to happen in the physical meetings and that the group is for communication.

TheScotsman

It’s on his freshers post. Her name was Anaïs, I didnt give names because I wasn’t sure I could. She seems influential and active. She said it’s okay. If it was me, I’d take that as okay

General_Cross

So if a person who ‘seems influential’ contradicts the rules written very clearly out in the a Facebook page by official committee members, you should just assume the rules go out the window?

General_Cross

With all due respect, an opinion doesn’t become right just because several people agree with you. He was removed because he tried to debate a sensitive issue in an area where debate is not permitted due to the safe space policy.

TheRationalist

FemSoc members said it was permitted and encouraged.

Boogaloo

Which members, where? Were they admins? Do the run the group in any way? The quote from the president herself says that the group is supposed to be used to communicate with members. And that discussion is supposed to happen at meetings.

General_Cross

In the physical meetings, not on the Facebook page. This is very clearly laid out on the page as part of their comments policy.

Kate

The trigger warnings were on the original post that this thread followed on from. The Tab failed to include this. Thank you.

Liberalfeminist1993

That doesn’t change the fact he was unjustly banned. I’m sorry but no matter how you look at it (I was there when it unfolded) we were wrong in this one.

Kate

Everyone is entitled to their opinion; the admin acted based on theirs, rightly or wrongly. Regardless, after his comments on his Freshers’ page post, he is not going to be invited back into the group. (He’s denied the existence of rape culture, privilege, and the lack of equality in the UK or US. He’s also called everyone on the orignal thread a moron.)

TheRationalist

Thanks for a much more sensible comment.

I read the comments, he seemed to defend himself as neither a feminist or MRA..

And he never denied any of those thing. By the same logic, he is less privileged by the white women making allegations. He is a POC.

Boogaloo

Not an MRA, but going on about their favourite talking point ie. false rape accusations?

TheRationalist

That’s only because it was brought up. His initial point was about our legal system.

Boogaloo

Yeah but only MRA’s genuinely think that false rape accusations are a serious issue. He was the one saying that there are “lots of false rape claims”. Everyone else was saying the opposite. Feminists tend to go on about believing people when they say they were raped. Unsurprising that if you go to a load of Feminists and say the opposite that they aren’t going to react well. I don’t know why he was surprised.

TheRationalist

Being surpised doesn’t equal a ban

gus

A little facebook-stalking reveals Mr Abbasi frequents ‘Feminist Hypocrisy’ – a sexist, misogynist, racist and anti-Semitic page that has dubbed women the ‘parasite gender’. He’s also into 4chan (and mimics their post format in places). And the LAD Bible.

This man is not a feminist or interested in becoming one.

Also we can’t ever know how much context the journalist has missed out. So absolutely shoot the messenger if they are suspected of doctoring (which other comments on this have led me to believe.)

General_Cross

Certainly shoot them if they have been called out for misrepresenting a position and change their article to a personal attack!

Liberalfeminiat1993

I stalked him too, but if you look at his activity, he joined that not too long ago.

I’m also certain that page is satire.

I know feminists that like that bible page for their vines and stuff, but also girlfriends of those guys that like it. A huge amount of men do including feminists.

That’s not a official 4Chan page, it posts green texts. Anyway, I’m a female, feminist and frequent 4Chan, what are you trying to say?

Boogaloo

That 4Chan is pretty notorious as a hive of toxic stuff about women? They were behind those leaks of celebrity nudes.

Liberalfeminist1993

No, that’s tarring everyone with the same brush. 4Chan isn’t a person, that statement is like calling all feminists man haters..they weren’t behind it, an individual was. Some of the closest people I know I met on 4Chan.

4Chan also created many equality icons, just not under the name of feminism. I’m actually offending you can judge such a diverse community like that.

As an avid and frequent user of 4chan…you literally have no idea what you are talking about.
4chan is not a person and 4chan also has about 50 boards which people can go on.
Only 3 or 4 boards are full of people like that.
So shhhhhhhhhhhhh

TheIntelligentBeing

There you go folks, feminism isn’t about equal rights. Summed up by the feminists themselves. It’s about advancing the interests of women. We have equal rights (there are some sex-specific ones) now. Feminism is an ugly power-struggle. I’m glad as a fresher I know what societies and people to avoid.

Eyeroll

So glad you are able to take an overview of the entire movement from this single episode. Perhaps you should also denounce all of Christianity on the basis of Fred Phelps, and all of Islam based on a terrorist?

TheHumanist

But they have a society. We wouldn’t let intolerable imams in our Islamic Society. Or homosexual-bashing Christians. I think this person meant that as a whole, whether rightly or wrongly, that feminism isn’t about equal rights. This person is saying that Alex admits this..I’m.going to further assume they aren’t going.to associate themselves with the movement. It’s their right.

General_Cross

Interestingly the President gave details to the author about why she feels it is not an equality movement, but they are mysteriously absent from this article.

TheToad

It took you ages to make that point. Now that I agree with, however it doesn’t change the fact he was unjustly silenced when he didn’t break the rules.

General_Cross

‘Unjustly silenced’ is a very dramatic response to being removed from a facebook group. All the same we have different opinions on the matter but it is not our decision. The Feminist Network wrote their rules and they can judge who breaks them.

Eyeroll

It’s not a society, it’s a discussion group. The Facebook group is there to facilitate the discussion group and share resources (NOT to debate or educate).

TheScotsman

FemSoC means nothing to you. And according to the members, discussion on the page was welcome

Not this one it seems…

Boogaloo

Where on the page? And in the quote from the president in the article she says that it isn’t a discussion group but is supposed to be used for communication. Looks to me like it just gets treated as one by random people who join the group. I suppose they can’t really stop it unless they literally remove every post which tries to start a discussion.

TheRationalist

One of the important members who I think is an admin said it.

Boogaloo

How do you know they are an admin? And by important do you mean that they comment a lot? That doesn’t mean that they actually have anything to do with the running of the group at all. And it literally says in the comments policy that the aim of the group isn’t to be a discussion space and in the quote from the president in the article.

goldie

feminism is about “making life better for them [women]” because women live in a world where they are not equal to men and THEREFORE try to make life better for women, with the objective of attaining equality.

guest123145

I can’t seem to find any comment that displays misogyny towards the group. Also calling rape accusations ”Imaginary” is very unprofessional.

TheAveragePerson

FemSoc, I only have this to say to you: My
Grandfather smoked his whole life. I was about 10 years old when my
mother said to him, “If you ever want to see your grandchildren
graduate, you have to stop immediately.” Tears welled up in his eyes
when he realized exactly what was at stake. He gave it up immediately.
Three years later he died of lung cancer. It was really sad and
destroyed me inside. My mother said to me – ‘Don’t ever smoke. Don’t put your
family through what your Grandfather put us through.’ I agreed. At 21, I
have never touched a cigarette. I must say, I feel a very slight sense
of regret for never having done it, because your post gave me cancer
anyway.

?!?!

Thanks for trivialising cancer that’s really aided the discussion.

TheAveragePerson

A family member died of cancer. I have every right to make a joke. You can’t dictate what people laugh at. It’s not your call. Hence why comedians like Jimmy Carr and Frankie Boyle are so damn popular.

wtf man

Now you’re trivialising AIDS. Bad form.

Seabiscuit

Made-up statistics, ignorance and censorship are the bastions of student politics. I don’t know why anyone is surprised by this. Nothing harms feminism more than student feminists.

FuckErRightInThePussy

Well said.

stillprotestthisshit

Made-up statistics?

Please elaborate. The article has since given the sources for the statistics Alex quoted and the OP has linked to the stats of the original post higher on the thread as well.

Also, it’s not censorship. He was allowed his say what he thought. That’s free speech. He then suffered repercussions for what he said, which is not violation of free speech. If he had been stopped from expressing his view then yeah, sure, but Safe Space policy takes priority. Also as we’ve seen, a ban from the group didn’t stop him.

TheRationalist

I’m glad he wasn’t stopped. The Safe Space policy is a load of crap since the President talked about rape. What if Muwahhid is a male rape victim, or anyone else was?

cripes

Safe spaces allow discussion of potentially triggering topics if they are warned, which they were.

TheRationalist

I find funny that the first comment was actually technically debate because she spoke about the posted article. If it was neither me a neither meant to educate or cause discussion/debate, why was it posted? It wasn’t an advert for an event…

stillprotestingthisshit

Sharing a resource? And she then added another bit of info that (as noted) supported the OP. It was the fresher that started a ‘debate’ by telling her she was wrong.

TheRationalist

Apparently it’s not a discussion forum. Alex began discussion whether you like it or not.

Naturally, a new member followed which was in the rules.

#HeForShe

First of all, the UN in their #heforshe campaign, states that feminism is about equal rights for both genders. Okay, so women will benefit most from this, but that isn’t solely what the campaign is about. Also “false rape accusations are only 2% of cases”, is total bollocks. Prove that statement. Oh wait you can’t, because most of the time men will get punished for rape anyway. I’m not saying rape isn’t a serious issue, it is. But a lot of women cry rape, when really it wasn’t.

Also, why have a Facebook page about feminism if you don’t want people to comment about on it, about feminism. That just doesn’t make sense.

dlrjgt

1. Sure. Alex has her view of the ideology. That’s different to yours. Feminism isn’t homogenous.
2. That is exactly why the statistics were shared in the first place. Two links have been given (one in the article, one by the OP in these comments).
3. It’s not ‘about’ feminism, it’s ‘for’ feminism. Obviously. It’s called the Feminists’ Network. Muwahhid is not a feminist therefore he can get out.

TheRationalist

1. That’s fine, but she called a misogynist and banned him, that’s wrong.
2. She said men, then boys. She did back up which is why this fresher said “oh, I thought you meant” and then continued with a different point. Read the full thing.

2. It was NOT on the Feminist Network page, which has a different set of rules. It was on the FemSoc page, a University of York Society. The rules are different. Trust me, I’ve read them.

CRIPES

FEMSOC DOES NOT EXIST.
It’s the Feminists’ Network, a branch of WomCom.

Samuel L Jackson

For the men out there, I will give you some solid advice. Do NOT engage with feminist (men and women) in any shape or form. Leave them to complain about society and the “patriarchy”. Focus on yourself, hit the gym, get educated and make money. Soon you’ll be finding yourself fucking these women (some feminist are actually quite hot).

Fuckherrightinthepussy

I’m doing that to one now.

Mr. Cat

Muwahhid is a moron and should be banned from university. dickhead.

Mr. Cat

This kind of troll needs to be castrated

James

And you are the scum of this earth. You should be banned from the world, scum.

Why post smart arse comments that are checking the technicalities of a stat when the main sentiment of her post is what’s important… He has nothing to gain from it; I am 100% sure he knew he’d piss off some people doing it. Then play the innocent “I was just engaging in healthy debate” card. Just don’t comment mate.. a group of feminists righty won’t appreciate someone pulling them up on their posts in a place they’ve created to speak freely about an issue to people who agree. Especially when, regardless if he’s right or not, he is not a woman and does not face the struggles that feminists aim to bring to light/alleviate, so naturally his comment will annoy them more, as I expect that a female feminist would overlook a mis-quoted stat given the bigger picture and the issue raised being what’s important, not the bloody sources of her a stat…

Nothing to gain from it, I loathe people like this guy. Then he plays the “owww femsoc blocked me, I’m so victimised when I was just trying to help”. Naaaaah.

Note that I am not commenting on the issue, just the motives of this mug.

James

Bollocks mate, If he knew exactly what he was doing, why go out of his way to request to join FemSoc and get banned it 10 minutes. He was saying that just because one matter is proportionanally higher than other, doesn’t make another false. Also, even if the issue is so small, the way Alex made it out was bad. Also, she called false rape allegations imaginary. It was all trigger-warned. It doesn’t matter if he is a woman or not, feminism is apparently for both sexes, and Watson’s UN speech makes this clear.

Someone other than this guy asked for a stat. He never said he was trying to help, he asked on the fresher’s page whether anyone else had been banned and they had. Don’t assume his motives, even if the dude is a prick.

“MUH TRIGGER WARNINGS”

‘Trigger warnings’
Get a grip…it’s the internet and not your ‘safe space’
I will not limit my free speech because my argument destroys your reasoning and may upset you feelings.
“I don’t want anybody to be triggered” Is not a valid argument at all and is just damage control when you know that you are losing a debate.
By the way, saying that you have sources and then NOT stating sources

because “I am on my phone”, still makes any argument you make invalid until those sources are stated. How do we know that you aren’t making some blindly stupid claim?

Fuckherrightinthepussy

Well said.

Wow.

Boy, the Tab’s really having fun bashing feminism this term, huh?

Fuckherrightinthepussy

I wouldn’t say “feminism” I’d say FemSoc in particular.

Par

This is why Alex Wilson got rejected from Oxford

Fuckherrightinthepussy

Didn’t Cambridge just get classes in consensual sex? I imagine Oxford is next…It would be a breeding ground of hate if she joined.

4. Cite the 1 in 5 myth about women being raped. Funny how feminists quote the very people that hate them on to make this a point. Just talk to people around you, the 5 women near me have not.

cripes

4 is very common statistical fallacy.

cripes

BREAKING NEWS
CHAIR OF FEMINISTS’ NETWORK HUMAN, HAS FLAWS

jordan

This seems a pretty silly article. The purpose of the facebook page is not debate on the merits of current feminist theory. It is intended for other purposes- advertising events. Free and open debate is not ‘banned’, it is just not the point of the facebook page. The space explicitly designated, exclusively, for posting events has received a bunch of long comments on feminist orthodoxy, no wonder the member was removed, surely? I fail to see how this represents a ‘free speech ban’, that’s over the top.
The tab is frequently compared to a cross between the daily mail and daily star. This article does remind me of the old, hyperbolic ‘loony left’ material of the daily mail. It is, after all, a misleading, storm-in-a-tea-cup story about free speech destroying femi-nazi’s.

Gratis Ptaka

In the US, “yes means yes” is the next in a long line of laws and policies to destroy men that don’t tow the feminist/gynocentric line. The more men opt out of marriage, the more misandric the laws and policies will become. Hades hath no fury like that of a woman scorned. Women will gladly use the law to destroy men that refuse to live on bended knee.

Efforts are already underway to have this law pushed up to the criminal justice level. This law will spread to all campuses. For those who don’t think this can’t happen, remember that, through VAWA, you can now be removed from your home for yelling at your wife. No one thought that could happen either.

Next comes redefining domestic violence in terms of denial of monetary resources and the redefinition of cohabitation in terms of asset division and alimony. Many a naive and ignorant man will learn these lessons too late. Tens upon tens of millions of men, in the US alone, through misandric laws and policies, have already been destroyed.

Don’t think the government will save you. The powerful, ignorant, cowardly white knights will gladly throw the lower status men under the bus. Why? To appease women, eradicate their competition and to get re-elected.

Men are disposable utilities. Men are valued in terms of what they produce and provide for women – even if that means the sacrifice of their lives. We can’t have them opting out, now can we.

If ever you want to see the uselessness and self-importance of student feminists, just read a tab comment section on a FemSoc article.

LoseyGosey

Challenging feminism’s ideas is a one way street to despair. If they have power they will abuse it to silence you. If they don’t they will play the victim until someone who does have power silences you. Its a common practice when ideologies lose their focus and sense of purpose. Nobody wants to pack up and go home so down the rabbit hole they go. This will continue as they grasp at straws to stay relevant and soon the only ones left will be the extremists that nobody takes seriously. Feminism is destroying itself piece by piece.